Uke-lear Assault

Not to oversell it, but yesterday was the highlight of the year for ukulele players in the East Riding of Yorkshire and in some cases beyond.

I arrived in Skipsea expecting to be the youngest person there by quite a margin and I wasn't far wrong.

I had promised myself that due to the fact I'd been nursing a cold for a few days it would be sensible to avoid alcohol. This promise lasted ten minutes. Upon being subjected to a group from Derbyshire performing Sloop John B, I realised that alcohol was going to be necessary if I were to survive the day.

They had Guinness, but it was clear that they wouldn't have enough to last the day.

I booked myself a 15 minute slot on “stage 2” which was basically a tent on the back patio of Skipsea Village Hall.

I sat and watched several groups belt out predictable Elvis and Beatles numbers and a woman who looked like Janet Street Porter sang about talking dirty in Hawaiian.

By the time I performed there weren't many people left in the tent and by the end there were just four people watching. This could have been damaging for my self esteem, but it was a good way to shake off the nerves I had about performing with Ted later on and at least the small crowd clapped and cheered, even though it may have been out of pity.

By this time my partner in crime, Ted Zeppelin, had arrived. He was the other half of The Brid Boys – a name we hadn't chosen but one that had been given to us by event organiser, Malcolm X (not his real name).

I nearly dropped a clanger when informing Ted I'd seen a “cunt with a manbun” who had a fairly fresh-looking Pink Floyd tattoo and was “probably one of those hipster arseholes who started playing the uke because he thought it was cool in an ironic way”. Ted looked uncomfortable and nudged me. At this point I turned around and saw the aforementioned manbunned cunt was standing not ten feet away. I've no idea if he heard what I'd said, but it was more than a little awkward. He was tuning up and played a few licks that I recognised as Radiohead.

“Why does every fucker play Radiohead?” Ted raged and headed inside to break his own promise of not drinking before we performed.

After tuning up and having a quick run through a couple of songs in an adjoining room we were as ready as we'd ever be.

Opening with Herb Alpert classic, Spanish Flea, we didn't exactly have the audience of 100 or so eating out of our hands, but we'd certainly shown them we were no Kum Ba Yah merchants like so many of the others.

We raced through a few more numbers, my voice seemingly winning in its battle against my cold. The crowd were responding more and more positively and we were enjoying ourselves. I could still hear my heart pounding in my ears above everything else, mind you.

The village of Skipsea was a regular haunt for Vikings back in the day, so it was fitting that I did a Norwegian song. I might have messed up the words in a couple of places, but I'm pretty sure nobody noticed. There were no actual Vikings present – at least there were no longboats in the car park.

Ted did a couple of his flamenco numbers to rapturous applause and I did a solo version of a Carly Simon classic for Mrs Tim, who was standing at the bar guarding our beers.

We finished with 99 Red Balloons – always a crowd-pleaser and performed it complete with the final two verses in very ropey German.

And that was it. We left the stage as the room cheered. Some people came and told us how much they'd enjoyed our set and one woman seemed quite emotional as she thanked us for playing. It felt weird to get so much praise for playing half an hour of material that had been practised to death in Ted's living room over a string of Sunday afternoons.

Now the serious drinking could start and we could hopefully enjoy some decent music.

Straight after us were UP, a duo from Nottingham. They played mostly blues and were frankly excellent. They played through amps whilst standing up – revolutionary in the ukulele world. Don't be fooled by the fact that one of them looked like he was half physics teacher, half Lenin – these guys could rock.

Another group who impressed were the Coolhand Ukes, even though none of them attempted to eat fifty hard-boiled eggs. They may have been cheating a bit though, as they had a bass guitarist and a fiddler in the group. There was no faulting their musicianship though. Quite folky, but excellent.

Filey's Ramshackle Shantymen were less impressive. They are five men who sing sea shanties whilst wearing hats. That's it. No instruments and I wasn't the only one who was baffled by their presence. I did learn that you can make any statement sound like a sea shanty by clenching your fists and loudly yelling “HEY!” after it.

The Uketeers had come all the way from Northumberland and really shouldn't have bothered. The only entertainment they offered was the fact that one of them looked like Kenny Rogers and I may perhaps have shouted an all-too-loud request for Islands in the Stream as a result. They didn't play it though.

Four Little Pluckers from Beverley were the final group I saw before throwing in the towel. They are four women, one of whom is an incredible player who isn't afraid to hog the limelight while the others hide in the background twiddling their thumbs. Their version of Duelling Ukuleles was quite spectacular though.

There was no Guinness left by then, so there was no point in sticking around.

It was a great day out though – much better than I expected. Malcolm X is already planning next year's festival and by that time maybe we'll have forgiven him for the casual nature with which he approached the drawing of the raffle. Maybe.